


Stage Lives

by aPaperCupCut



Category: Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs, Amnesia: Justine - Fandom, Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Penumbra (Video Games), SOMA (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Im bad at summaries, Mind Manipulation, Other, Slow Updates, its 4 am and im tired ok, its a road trip, pre amnesia daniel wasnt a good person, road trip through the dimensions, things pick up around 4th chap srry, this is a mess, very liberal with canon, weird orb stuff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-10-02 03:13:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17256533
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aPaperCupCut/pseuds/aPaperCupCut
Summary: Daniel wakes up, and does not know who he is, or ever was. The name he should know by heart dries and shrivels on his tongue, but no relief bears itself upon his shoulders.Daniel of Mayfaire was forgotten.Daniel touches an Orb, Alexander just wants to see his fiance again, Agrippa really just wants to go home, and the rest get caught up in the wild ride through dimensions.(Otherwise known as: that really weird fic where Daniel is very confused and everybody else is too)





	1. Chapter 1

Daniel Hapsharpe of Mayfaire was a thug of a man, easily recognizable by his wide forehead and stern frown. Well known, despite his brutish demeanor, but believed to be… a bit of a whimsical fellow. But no one gave much thought to such a common belief; he made sure of that.

 

If one was to ask the older gentlemen in the academic community of the lad, they'd be quite surprised by what such distinguished men would say. For while Daniel was young, he had been in the somewhat isolated group for a long time. And he'd made a very clear reputation for himself - for being a mess of contradictions.

 

“He's a fool, no doubt. Couldn't tell which way was up, let alone how to write an article on Western languages.”

 

“Daniel? Of Mayfaire? An intelligent man, of sharp wit. I wouldn't mind working with him again; he assisted with quite a few of my more difficult lectures on linguistics and history.”

 

“I remember him! What a good fellow. He helped get that damned Professor Lamanstar off my back. What a cold bastard - but Daniel told him what's what, didn' he!”

 

“I advise against ever meeting him. He has a disagreeable personality; always disrespectful, humouring the younger and snubbing the elder. He's destroyed the work of several of my colleagues, just by coughing out a terrible ruckus about ill judgement or what-have-you.”

 

A simpleton - yet, an intelligent academic. A helpful sort - and yet, also a rebellious youngster. 

 

An upstart, but also a professor, growing in stature.

 

“I can't tell you who the man is by  _ rumours. _ Those are all in poor taste; and besides, not many chat about him. Many see him as a thug, and thugs don't tend to like being gossiped about.

 

“He’s a man of some honour, I'll say that. If he were to see a youngster struggling with their work at the university he frequents, he'd assist. If he were to see a professor looking for an assistant, he'd assist. He truly is one to lend a hand, especially in dire situations. But…”

 

Out of sight, out of mind?

 

“Yes. But… there is something else… Yes, mustn’t forget that.

 

“He's a slippery one. Wont to sticking his fingers into pies he doesn't own. Perhaps it is intentional, perhaps not, but the reason he is so well known amongst us despite his small portfolio of work and experience, despite his relative silence, is that he can figure who has the most… enemies.”

 

“I remember meeting the boy years ago, when no one knew his name nor face. We judged him harshly; he did not have any traditional school backing him, nor any credentials of any sort. He was schooled ‘til he decided that was enough, and only joined the academic world when he decided that physical labour did not suit him.

 

“He was such a skittish child back then - very different from the confident man now. He was silent, but had a quick tongue when he chose; but what was most interesting was his ability to play the fool.

 

“Who knows if he truly is an idiot. I couldn't tell back then, and even now I am unsure of when he is playing. All I know is that it let him get to places and around people he otherwise might not have. There's a lot of power to be had when others underestimate you.

 

“What he did then is what he still does now, occasionally.”

 

* * *

 

_ There is a woman, throwing her arms out to try to slow the falling fist. It does nothing to stop the crunch of bone, it does nothing to stop her howl of pain as he yells, mocking her. Once again the punishing hand falls, and she collapses under its weight. _

 

_ You are watching from beside the closet, obscured from sight, under a thick winter quilt. You are watching the man named father hit her, over and over. The hits are the sounds of barren feet against cobblestone; they are the sounds the other boys’ hands make when they touch you. Her eyes loll in her skull, blood poisoning her lips. She smiled too much, you think, but you can't look away. _

 

_ She hid you, when he slammed the front door, hid you, and is being beaten now. _

 

( _ The vision shifts; melts, twists into something different, eerily familiar. Eerily familiar because it is another memory from too long ago. _ )

 

_ She is limp, this time. The little boy doesn't think there'll be a next time, for her. _

 

_ He looks down, into his arms; sleeping quietly there, her brown eyes closed, is small, weak Hazel. _

 

_ Small, weak - and cherished;  _

( _ the image changes and he's once more blinded by it. _ )

 

_ She watches him, watches as he survives the belt. She is hidden, and he's locked his gaze on her. He's living for her, he thinks; and he doesn't remember the woman. _

 

_ The next time the boys come for him, he picks up a rock and decides that he won't die. _

 

( _ not like mother, i'm not weak like mother _ )

 

* * *

_ The crematorium - He could only afford so much, and the hospice was entirely disinterested in dealing with the bodies. This one was overfilled; too many dead, too soon. She's hiding again, just as he taught her. _

 

_ But she's not hidden well enough. He finds her, corpse half crushed under a dozen others. Her eyes are open wide, filmy and white. Her yellow dress is filthy. _

 

( _ she loved the colour. the colour of sunshine and warmth, she said. he thought she must be the living embodiment of it, for smiling so sweetly after coughing blood, for laughing so quietly even as the sterile smell of the room forced the sunlight from its walls. _ )

 

_ He picks her up, his hands shaking. Her head lolls, limp against his arm. Her body is small. _

 

_ She's dead. _

 

_ His teeth grind; he can't stop shaking. Horror and anger and so much, so much - boils over him, and he can't think. Can't speak. _

 

_ Why was she dead? Why had she died? Hadn't he survived? Hadn't he? Hadn't that meant something? The marks on his back, the phantom memory of blood on his face, hot-cold-and-painful - had that meant nothing? _

 

_ Filthy, filthy - He drops her limp, filthy body, shoulders shaking. He can't tear his eyes from her, can't think. _

 

_ This… _

 

This fucking bitch.

 

This rotten, spoiled  _ bitch. _

 

He'd done everything, had sacrificed so  _ fucking _ much - and she's dead.

 

She's - ungrateful.

( _ she can't be anything else. he can't stand the thought, that she didn't, but he can abide that thought that she did. _ )

\--Ungrateful - unmarked skin, his self respect - his dignity - had that meant  _ nothing? _

 

( _ The woman had died, and he forgot her. Had she meant nothing? _ )

 

_ He drops the body -- lets the maggots crawl over it, but is unable to look away. Something wet is flowing down his cheeks; he resists the impulse to scratch at it, ignores the thoughts of bugs, crawling over him. Crawling across his skin. Large, fat beetles.  _ Vermin.

 

_ He feels as though his soul is collapsing. His hands still shake in anger, in outrage, but his throat is blocked; something strange and cold is choking him.  _

 

_ And all he can see is the ghost of what he wanted: she's smiling, eyes bright and clear. Her skin is warmth, unblemished. She's playing with other children _

 

(not those boys. 

faceless children, 

without mouths.)

 

_ and speaks coherently. No one is touching her. She wears the bright dresses he always bought with money he didn't have, instead of the drab hospice wear she insisted were comfortable enough. _

 

_ Then, he sees what happened: _

 

She was angry. Angry, hateful; she was in such pain, and even if he believed he had done as much as he could, she was still in such pain. Such pain, such awful terrible pain, and so young. ( _ and yet you wish to wring her neck, for leaving you to suffer alone, for the rest of your detestable, pathetic life. _ )

 

_ She was dead. _

 

_ Daniel turned, and walked away. _

 

* * *

“He was much smaller, then. Terrible posture, and quieter than the grave. Not many knew him. No one knew where he came from; all we knew was that he was an outsider. Unlikely to succeed, was the general consensus.

 

“Men like Jonathan Preston were well respected, and well feared. He had published dozens of papers, all very well written and researched; he held the biggest social gatherings, places where he secured funding from aristocracy and loyalty from his fellows. But he was not a good man. Not by any means.

 

“We all knew this. It was something not talked about, but we all knew. He drove out the weaker, stomped out the new talent. He secured his high position through brute force and sharp wit (and quite a lot of money, I must admit). He knew what he was doing. And Daniel, when he first entered the academic world, quickly learned this.

 

“To this day, I don't know how he picked up on Preston’s position that quickly. New people did not linger back then; nowadays we are much more welcoming, but back then they were chased away before they could learn much of the social aspect of such a grouping of intelligent men. Daniel changed things. Much more than he should've, I think; he did it not out of interest for the future, but out of a guttural instinct to thrive. And Jonathan Preston, for all of his prestige and ability, stood in the way of that.

 

“I remember exactly how it happened. There were perhaps a dozen people, in that library. Preston was holding us all in rapt attention, as he spoke in low tones about the recent excavation he took part in. Such parties, where one could draw interest from peers and blue blood alike, were not something unusual in those days. Many of us still do it, but it is a much more private practice now.

 

“On that particular day, Daniel was attending not out of interest in the subject, but because Preston wished to strike fear into the hearts of anybody new, and Daniel was, of course, new. What Preston planned was to humiliate the boy; ask him frequent questions, insinuate that he knew nothing and could add nothing, and, if Daniel proved stubborn, take him aside and threaten him with something more… substantial. In such a way Preston would insure no one would wish to work with such an empty headed academic nor would any wealth come his way. But the strange boy knew this, and he had concocted his own plan.

 

“As we all listened, Preston… grew fevered. It was out of the ordinary; the man began to sweat, and grow red in the face. He excused himself for a brief moment, and, once he had disappeared into the adjacent corridor, Daniel stood. The boy looked… different. He stood with a straight back, towering over us. His face was dark, expression grim. He spoke in a quiet murmur, asking us to watch and to not speak a word. We were curious and confused, but I believe all of us, in the ensuing confusing events, chose to stay our silence not out of shock or confusion, but because of that bizarre lad’s request.

 

“Something else of note: Preston was unusual in the group, for he was wed. But even married men are wont to wander, and Preston was just like the rest of us bachelors - frequent visits to the brothel, and many mistresses who knew how to hold their tongues and accept a pretty penny from a rich, unfaithful man. We all knew of his wife, just as we all knew of his constant conquests. And, of course, we did not speak of it.

 

“That isn't to say he was unopen to discussion; he quite enjoyed being the braggart. And this was what Daniel chose to take advantage of, as soon as the man returned.

 

“As we all stayed silent, Daniel began to prod Preston of his women. Quietly, at first, but as Preston grew more proud, he let his voice rise. You must also know that we always imbibed during such groupings, and Daniel was subtly serving Preston… quite a few drinks. The boy, of course, did not go without, and I am sure I was the only one to note this.

 

“As the hour dragged on, several quietly joining the discussion of copulation and corner women (and a few men, but we were secretive enough to hide each other from such a scandalous activity), and Preston and Daniel grew louder and louder in their discussion. Not but at the second hour mark, we heard a creak behind us.

 

“Standing there was a tall and slender woman, with the finest of clothe and with the prettiest of jewels; obviously of high breeding. Preston stopped in the middle of a speech about another one of his mistresses, standing up abruptly. We all watched silently.

 

“The woman had tears running down her face, and Preston grew enraged. He shouted at her, scolding her for her presence - and then, the woman snapped.

 

“She stormed up to him, skirts swaying, and smacked him. The sound was loud in the silence, and his cheek was a brilliant red, from drink and from pain. A small cut from her nails bled slowly, red against red.

 

“We were all very much appalled, and excused ourselves quickly. And all the while, Daniel simply smiled.”

 

* * *

_ He is pressing the pages together, slowly putting the aged documents away. Herbert's words echo in his ears, and he can feel his heart pound excitedly. But still, doubt festers inside him. _

 

_ An expedition? He's gone on a few before, but they were much closer to home, and were held for much shorter periods of time. He cannot leave while Hazel is-- _

 

_ He brings thin hands to his brow, and presses gently on his tired eyes. His nails are rough on his temple, the chemical stains making the skin dry. He rarely works with chemistry, but he finds himself assisting chemists a mite too often. He doesn't really prefer such things. _

 

_ Eventually, he finishes the documents, and quietly shuts and locks the archive’s door. It is late; very few besides himself are wandering about the empty halls. He finds himself unsettled, constantly glancing to the sparse torches that are lit only for the image of prosperity. Although he considers himself a brave man, he can't help the shivers that crawl up his arms, or the quiet grinding of his teeth. The dark has never sat well with him. _

 

_ As he finally exits the large property, he thinks back once more to the professor's offer. _

 

_ He has been working with Professor Herbert off and on for several years now, and what he knows of the man is limited. The professor is rather secretive, despite his calm and warm demeanor. Herbert seemed to have taken quite the liking to him, however, and had extended the prestigious position in the expedition as a kind of gift. If he followed along, who knew what kinds of artefacts he'd find for the museum and university, and what kind of attention he'd gain for such a journey. _

 

_ He finds himself pressing his hands to his temple again, a nervous kind of flutter in his chest. Again, his mind seems to revert, to become nonsensical… even after all this time. Even after years and years on this earth, he can't keep his brain, the thing that has insured he would not starve, from believing in something so futile. _

 

_ He takes a deep breath, then begins his trek back to his home. _

 

_ Daniel decided he would follow the Professor, if only to strike back against the phantom memory of Hazel. _

 

* * *

Daniel wakes up, and does not know who he is, or ever was. The name he should know by heart dries and shrivels on his tongue, but no relief bears itself upon his shoulders.

 

Daniel of Mayfaire was forgotten.


	2. Chapter 2

Daniel takes in a shaky breath, unwilling to remove himself just yet from the closet he's squeezed himself into. The monster has long since departed from the spacious room, yet his heart refuses to calm. His hands sweat and an impatience rolls over him, foreign and terrified. But he refuses. He refuses to be mollified by his own fear. Not this time.

 

He needs a moment. A moment to think, to breath, to truly consider  _ what _ the  _ hell _ is happening. Because he really doesn't know. And he gets the unpleasant feeling of this being the last moment of quiet he would get in awhile.

 

When he first woke up, it was all staggered steps, half remembered words rising up in his throat only to be choked back down. Barely able to stand straight, it was a wonder that he'd managed to outpace whatever was licking at his heels. But outpace it he had, and now that he'd swallowed enough air to finally swim, he could look out around him to find land.

 

The first thing he puts his mind to, of course,  are his missing memories. When he closes his eyes, sometimes there is a flash, a bright liquid fire of colour and sound that burns his retinas, yet it vanishes like smoke as soon as he reaches for it. Words emerge in his mind, but they are nonsensical--

 

( _ Fingers around a throat. his lips bleed, spots of crimson on the other boy's face. _

_ He will punish them so long as they cackle behind his back. _ )

 

And… dangerous.

 

Daniel presses his thumbs into his eyes, blocking out the flair up behind them with the black spots that form with the pressure.

 

And the  _ whispers. _ God, the whispers.

 

They are constant, consistent; different from the things he swears he hears tumble from his mouth, different from the strange snatches of other men muttering. Daniel doesn't know whether his past self was this strange - words sometimes bursting out of his mouth in whispers and gasps, completely unintentionally, because he is  _ afraid _ of the things coming out of him. It feels like he's always talking aloud - and no one is around to tell him if he is or not. It is only when his lips move numbly, fumbling around sentences, stale air disturbed by the tang of his throat.

 

The  _ whispers _ … they are so very different from even those unpleasant moments of speech. Again, he thinks of the few remnants of his past self - those flashes of memory, as he hears himself speak but has no cognition of it. Of the letters and journal entries, written so specifically, like he wanted someone to see. Like he  _ expected _ someone to see.

 

Daniel sucks in a breath when his right eye flushes with bizarre sensation, a prickle just behind it stretching out to the back of his skull. He impulsively tries to fight it off - throws his head back, bursting stars into his vision at the impact, but it doesn't stop. It won't stop, he knows it won't, but could it just - please, God, he begs God, let it  _ stop _ \--

 

He curls in on himself. These aren't memories. They're not hallucinations, brought on by the vile liquid that his hand instinctively opens, that his tongue laps the lip of, that settles his bones but makes him feel so very ill. They're not the blackouts and skin crawling fits that arrive in the darkness, when roaches the size of his head swarm his body. When he frantically scrambles at himself, panicked breathes leading the monsters closer. Blood and bile and white hot horror - this isn't it.

 

_ Come closer, _ it says.  _ Keep going. I see you. Come closer. _

 

And his feet - how eager they are, springing to action at the unknown impulse. He forgets - forgets that he doesn't know this place, he doesn't know why he's here, he barely knows his God forsaken  _ name  _ \- and suddenly all he needs to do is to continue forward. He doesn't know if he'll follow the instruction of the almost certainly mad Daniel of the past. He doesn't know if he's looking for answers.

 

Daniel doesn't know why he keeps going. He doesn't want to, not anymore. Possibly he never did. He thinks that is why he was able to identify the moments when mint is laid upon his tongue, when a spike of lightning reaches in through his eyes, straight to the back of his head.

 

_ come closer come closer come c l o s e r _

 

As the sensation fades, he realizes his teeth are chattering, loud murmurs, almost whimpers, rising in pitch and then crumbling with his inhale and exhale. He feels so cold, sweat sticking his limp, greasy hair to his forehead, forcing his thick clothing to cling closer to his weak body. He shakes and can't stop. The thing in his brain isn't gone - no,  _ no, _ it never leaves, God, it'll never  _ leave, _ but its loosened its horrifying grasp on his mind.

 

He tumbles out of the closet on newborn legs, something alien propelling him forward.

 

He can't think about Alexander. He can't think about past Daniel. All he can truly know is that his mind is not his own. Nor can he be if sure it ever was.

 

* * *

The corpse hangs, gleaming white eyes staring into his very core. He can't look away. The switch is heavy on his fingers, and he almost can't believe he's truly hearing what he hears - he can't think over the dull roar of ‘ _ another person there's another person an actual  _ person  _ who speaks and listens and  _ responds  _ and he can hear me! _ ’

 

Agrippa - for that is the corpse’s nomenclature - has a warm curl in his voice, and he only pauses after going over one specific thing. Daniel finds himself sitting down, his back aching and jaw burning from how tightly he's gripped it through the nightmare that seems nowhere close to ending. But if this wasn't real, Agrippa wouldn't be here, now would he?

 

He never forces sound to croak out from his vocal chords. Can't bear the looming thought of sounding just like that man - that  _ monster. _ But Agrippa hears him anyway - he smiles with words and answers Daniel's unspoken anxieties, soothing hands fluttering in the static of Daniel's mind.

 

He does his very best not to think about the growing regularity of the  _ other _ thing's presence, the growing pain in his joints, how his limbs hasten to move without his consent. How the feeling of losing time, of a beast getting too close - of course, of course he can feel it, how could he  _ not? _ The Shadow, his long Shadow, Daniel's Godforsaken  _ Shadow _ . So long and terrible it is that it follows a man who bears the monster's name and face only.

 

And so he does his best not to think about the quickening in his bones, the thing that urges him on, urges him  _ faster faster faster _ . The thing that forces him forward even when his heart falls apart and breaks, his own hands mocking him with their bloodlessness. As a monster, shouldn't he be dressed in his own art? God. He called it  _ art  _ \- that monster believed himself a craftsman.

 

The only craft he had orchestrated was the devil's portrait.

 

Agrippa - Agrippa helps. Little words about things that seem to matter but don't. Every moment he can steal, those moments of pain and noise, those help. Daniel doesn't give a word, but Agrippa hears him anyway.

 

“Oh, definitely, young Daniel!”

 

“Yes, this does appear a most dire a situation - but don't rush too much, dear fellow. One misses what one rushes past.”

 

“Daniel, my friend, it is a truth, I assure you!”

 

A smile is a weak, washed out thing inside him, yet he dwells on the taste. A taste of conversation; of someone responding. Responding to the swell of his nonvoice. He doesn't know how Agrippa does it, but it is the same as Alexander's cruel echoes, it is the same as the  _ other’s _ haunting whispers. And Daniel is not afraid of it - not from Agrippa. Not from the only person, the first person, who pays mind to Daniel.

 

And so Daniel does, indeed, cut off his first friend’s head.

 

* * *

It is glowing in his palms. Each piece slides into the other, the tar squeezing out and marring his calloused hands. And he cannot take his gaze away from it, even as the thing in his chest chafes at the stillness and the Shadow hastens behind him.

 

_ It is an empty thing, _ Daniel thinks.  _ An empty thing because it lost itself to another. _

 

_ Am I not the same? _

 

The thought ensnares him; terrifies and calms in equal measure. If he is an empty thing, then once his husk of a body has been drained of blood and despicable life, he will not go to his Father in Heaven nor to the Serpent in Hell. He will simply vanish into the ether; a fitting end for the murderer he is. The blood stained monster he is.

 

But the terror; the terror of  _ not _ being. Not of the future - no, it is a horror of the present. He feels his skin crawl and things attempting to swallow him,  _ mouthing _ at his flesh. He is empty. He is nothing.

 

He shivers, and he feels the blue light of the Orb begin to lick lines of fire up his fingers. His digits tremble against the surface, as he loosens his grip and lets the ethereal artefact slip into place. The entryway, with all its splicing sky light, crackles and then spreads wide.

 

Daniel cannot bear to be near the hollow creature any longer. He stills his breath, closes his eyes; they burn, those delicate slivers of eyelid, burn as they press together. He breathes, and opens them once more. Lets his feet, his tired feet, sore and scraped, carry him on.

 

Inside his pocket, a voice is unheard. Whispered inside his ear and out the other -

 

_ closer closer c l o s e r you are so close time time is running, running out, come, come to me _

 

* * *

“I was wondering if you were going to show up.”

 

The man - the stranger - seems so… unrepentant. Unyielding. Daniel holds his breath, tries to withhold tears. He succeeds, but he feels his heart thunder in his empty chest. The blue light is no longer a balm; instead, it only burns.

 

“I see Agrippa convinced you to run some errands. Tell me, is everything nice and clear now?” A hand, fingers splayed elegantly out, stretched toward Daniel. An offer, but for what? For nothing. Alexander had nothing. “Am I the villain? Good and evil… Such comforting concepts. But hardly applicable.”

 

His heart is sending its death rattle. As the wind swirls around them, a distant keel of sound that locks Daniel’s feet and keeps him steady, he tugs out the silent skull. Agrippa is asleep, unknowing and deaf to the sneer in his once associate's voice.

 

“Are you so blind that you see no good in me? Nor evil in Agrippa?”

 

Daniel is inhaling, exhaling, ten seconds each, a push and pull of his lungs. His mind is at peace. He is so very tired.

 

The Ritual’s tools hum around him.

 

“Tell me, Daniel. Do you not even recognize me? For I fear death would be too kind a mercy for you; you suffer only under your own hands.” Still talking. The man he does not know will never stop - not until they are both dead.

 

_ No… _

 

He raises the head in his hands. Daniel can't listen. His teeth ache. His eyes - they tear, but he refuses. He refuses to see it. A pulsating throb, he is so very aware - aware of it, its presence a coal on his cheek. The others are so empty - but not that one. No, no, that one still has its weak Guardian, its catching Shadow.

 

“No! You fool!”

 

Awakening. Stirring in his hands. Agrippa sees hope for the first time in millennia.

 

“You will ruin us! Ruin us both!” Howl. Howl, because you have lost, dearest creature, lost friend. You have lost.

 

“No! Daniel--!”

 

_ Daniel--! _

 

_ Y O U A R E H E R E,  finally, finally, ccclllooossseee _

 

The Shadow screams, Alexander screams, Agrippa screams, the very walls of Brennenburg  _ scream.  _ Blue floods the saturated room - red and black oozes through the walls, but they are torn away, bleached white by the force - and the shattering of stone-turned-glass-turned-coal fills Daniel's senses.

 

Daniel does not scream as the Shadow consumes him. He does not scream as the world warps. He does not scream as his bone turn to metal and his teeth to rust.

 

He does not scream as he is thrown, as others are mixed into his spine, as he becomes nothing.

 

Daniel does not scream, but he remembers the blood in his mouth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im tired so fuck html editing :( yall gonna have to look at this horrible formatting srry
> 
> in other news this is just a bit of fun


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